For more than 25 years, the U.S. Catholic Church has been dealing with the horror of widespread clergy sex crimes and cover-ups. Yet U.S. abuse survivors have never received official acknowledgment of their pain by any federal official.

Even in the exceedingly unlikely event that every bishop miraculously agreed on how to approach the question of Communion and abortion, it still would not resolve the political question of abortion in favor of the Catholic position.

Decisions about administering the Eucharist rest solely on the bishop giving the sacrament, said Cardinal Michael Czerny.

Can we imagine Daniel Berrigan’s portrait, all gussied up, unfurled above the high altar of St. Peter’s? I know I can; but on his centenary it is more than enough to envision this great American’s visage on view in a gallery in the nation’s capital.

The question remains alive today, perhaps even more so after a year of living through the Covid-19 pandemic. But today it might be rephrased as two different questions for two different audiences: “How shall one go to confession now?” and “Why go to confession at all?”

Pope Francis on Friday accepted the resignation of Wilmington, Delaware Bishop Francis Malooly, who at 77 is two years beyond the normal retirement age for bishops.